I took a deep breath and calmed my mind.
The greater the hurry, the more you must slow down. Head burning hot, heart ice cold.
There was enough time.
"I’ll take the lead, so keep up and don’t fall behind."
"What? You’ll take the lead yourself? C-Commander!"
Leaving my flustered men behind, I pushed into the passage. Duke Johannes of Radensdorf’s personal guard didn’t so much as flinch at the sight of me bursting out at them.
They were already braced to fight.
The Courage 200% Boost Scroll grants tremendous strength and courage. As the enemy pressed toward me, coolly holding their formation, I charged in with reckless abandon.
In this one moment, I trusted nothing but my own martial skill.
As if I’d become Leto himself, I raised my halberd high overhead and brought it crashing down.
The axe blade, carrying enormous force, split the first lunging guardsman’s head clean in two. The soldiers behind him faltered for an instant.
Zornhau.
Splurt!
Blood fountained from the helmet of a soldier crumpled like paper by the wrath cut. A rain of blood fell from the sky. Radiating raw bloodlust, I had become a demon of slaughter this day.
I swung wide, tracing a great circle toward the guardsmen still standing dazed. The leather guard protecting the throat above one man’s breastplate tore away, and the axe blade took his head clean off.
"M-monster! Aaargh!"
I drove the spear point of my halberd into the face of a screaming soldier, killing him, and pressed on without hesitation. Bodies too mangled to recognize piled up under the fury of my halberd sweeping like a storm.
Split in one blow, like chopping firewood.
S-stop him!
Aaargh!
Crunch! Crunch!
The panicked guardsmen scrambled to block me, but I was already past the point of no return. Not one man there could withstand the halberd I brought down with such fearsome strength.
There was only a crimson feast.
My whole body was drenched in hot blood and shreds of flesh.
It was as if I’d taken a stim pack and pushed my mind and body past their limits.
Every time I swung the halberd without mercy, I saw plainly how frail the human body was and how much it relied on its armor. The soldiers’ armor was weak, like paper.
The infantry’s swords and spears cut and stabbed, but my Venetian plate armor deflected every blow, and I poured on my attacks without a care, as if I’d become an invincible knight.
It was a reckless offensive I could never have imagined in my ordinary state.
Crunch! Crunch!
Gaaah!
Even full plate armor has its weak points.
There’s no such thing as invincible armor in this world.
If they’d struck the fine leather at the armpits or the groin, or knocked me down, it would have been quite dangerous. But the guardsmen were so overwhelmed by my prowess that they didn’t dare think of exploiting a weakness.
Consumed by terror, the guardsmen practically offered up their necks and waited, begging God for salvation. But the halberd showed no mercy, and I brutally split the waist of a soldier who turned to flee.
Like a wolf that had leapt into the middle of a flock of sheep, I fought like a madman, splitting heads with the axe blade and tearing through breastplates. Then I checked the time.
Twenty-five minutes, forty-three seconds.
Only seven minutes had passed, but bodies already littered the ground around me.
Then the Gale Knights and my soldiers came charging in with a roar.
"Follow the Commander!"
"Don’t you dare fall behind!"
"Damn it! Bring him down!"
The guard commander, coming to his senses, gave a proper order. I drove the spear point of my halberd into the belly of the soldier in front of me. He desperately grabbed the halberd’s head and held on.
"Damn it, all of you, pile on!"
"Aaaaah!"
In a flash the soldiers swarmed in, some seizing the halberd’s head while the rest grabbed my body, trying to drag me down. But instead of shaking them off, I drove hard into them.
"Rraaaah!"
I let out a shout, and the muscles in my gripping hands and braced thighs swelled as if they’d burst. With that overwhelming force and momentum, I shoved the soldiers back in an instant.
I hoisted up the soldier still impaled on the halberd. Then I slammed him down with all my strength. The soldiers who caught both their dead comrade’s body and the halberd toppled over in a heap.
But I’d brought it down so hard that I lost my grip on the halberd for a moment.
"He dropped his weapon! Strike!"
Seizing what they thought was their chance, the guardsmen worked up their nerve and rushed me, but I whipped the longsword off my back like lightning and cut down the soldiers to my left and right.
Slash!
Ordinarily, no matter how fine the longsword, it wouldn’t have cut a leather-wrapped neck guard so easily. But right now I sliced through it with no trouble at all. Though it was more crushing than cutting.
So this was the power of 200% courage?
The soldiers wrapped only their vital areas, the breastplate and thighs, in steel plate, and the rest was leather. And that was standard equipment. Full chainmail? Plate? Those were the exclusive privilege of the wealthy.
Plate armor worth a hundred and twenty silver coins wasn’t something just anyone could own. That was why I, who used to hate taking hits even in armor for fear of scratching it, was now ignoring blows entirely.
It was far faster and cleaner to let my armor deflect the enemy’s attack and then counter. Of course, thrusts aimed at the gaps in my helmet, my armpits, or my groin were dangerous, so I stayed wary of those.
Watching his men get slaughtered, the guard commander sank into despair.
"Forgive me for failing to complete my mission, Your Grace!"
"You’re a noble. Surrender."
"I’ll drag you down to purgatory with me! Hrraah!"
As the commander threw himself at me in desperation and brought his longsword down, I deflected it with a Krumphau, turning the blade aside, then cracked him across the face with the pommel and dropped him. But the commander wouldn’t give up and kept resisting.
Crunch!
At once I drove the longsword into the gap in his helmet.
I hadn’t wanted to kill him, but there was no choice.
"Gurgle, M-Mother. I d-don’t want to die... urk!"
"...May you find happiness in the next life."
I never kill for sport. They too had lives of their own. Sliding the longsword back into its sheath and taking up the halberd, I cruelly cut short their final stories.
With the enemy line completely broken, my men would have a far easier time mopping up. But I had only twenty minutes left now. Clearing the passage had eaten up twelve of them.
"Surrender now and I’ll spare your lives."
"..."
But the guardsmen refused to surrender.
They weren’t ordinary soldiers. They were guardsmen.
Their eyes were full of fear, yet not one of them surrendered. I salute your struggle. I wanted to send these men, fighting to see their mission through to the end, off with as little pain as possible.
Please, guide these pitiable lambs to heaven.
Amid the melee raging between my men and the guardsmen, I broke through the final line.
"Take the left at that crossroads!"
At Klaus’s shout, I headed for the crossroads.
But I stopped just short of stepping into it.
Through my Commander Scouter I’d spotted troops lying in ambush at the crossroads. It was a unit made up of crossbowmen and pikemen. A second line of defense.
Had I charged in blindly, I’d have been turned into a pincushion in an instant.
So I drove back the guardsmen coming at my back and shoved a few of them out into the crossroads. The bolts of the crossbowmen, who mistook them for the enemy, thudded into the guardsmen I’d pushed into the open.
"No, cease fire!"
"Th-they’re ours!"
Crossbowmen generally keep at least two ranks, the front rank firing while the rear reloads, then rotating—skilled at delivering continuous volleys. Which is why charging in carelessly would get you killed.
A guardsman driven against the wall, struck by the halberd, spoke to me as I paused for a moment. His eyes brimmed with hatred and madness, as though he meant to curse me. The eyes of a man facing death.
"Grrgh, you’ll never reach the prison tower."
"Everything I’ve ever set out to do, I’ve accomplished."
"Kkk, cough! You’ll fail this time. Heh heh heh."
"Then you’re going to help me."
The guardsman said no more.
He was already dead.